As a fan (and quasi journalist) of soccer in the US, I spend a lot of time reading, writing and thinking about soccer. What works, what doesn't, existing problems and potential solutions. Unfortunately, I feel like I spend more time complaining about things and asking questions then actually providing answers and outlining potential solutions. This article is my attempt to change that, and may be one in a series of articles.

One of the states that frustrates me the most is Connecticut. Currently it boasts a population of 3,576,452 as of 2016, while being bigger than only Delaware and it's immediate neighbor, Rhode Island. Yet for some reason, this state has five amateur men's soccer leagues. One is an over 40 league, so for the purpose of this article won't be included.

Why in the world does a state of this size and population have four men's league containing fifty one teams? Ultimately, that comes down to a number of things. Money, power, pride, a weak state soccer association, but why couldn't Connecticut show a better way forward now?

​I don't have answers for overcoming those objections, but maybe by showing what the possible outcome of working together would look like, teams and leagues will be galvanized to move towards a better future.

The structure of the new Connecticut State Soccer Conferences is simple. Four conferences of twelve teams, last place team gets relegated to the division beneath it, winner of the lower division gets promoted. Round robin, home and away schedule means you have a twenty two game season. This also makes it easy to coordinate a Connecticut State Soccer Cup that's open to all forty eight teams in the CSSC, with room to invite teams from local city or Hispanic leagues, or you can do the Cup with just the forty eight CSSC teams.

Admit it. That structure is awesome, and you'd love to see it happen. And there's still room to add new teams, by either promoting more teams up to create more space and keep schedules balanced, or you could just start a new Conference Five. This structure consolidates teams under one banner and makes it easier to market and promote soccer in Connecticut as a whole. Centralized social media for the Conference and the ability to use a service like MyCujoo for Conference wide live streaming. How would this be a bad thing?

Maybe it's time to start emailing this article to the people in charge of these leagues and sharing it with their social media pages. Who knows? Maybe we can make change happen from the ground up in the state of Connecticut.